The invention relates to a method of documenting animal treatment. More particularly, the invention relates to a method of documenting vaccination treatment against Governmentally Regulated Diseases.
In many countries of the world, governments have established regulations and monitoring systems for dealing with specific types of animal diseases, the so called Governmentally Regulated Diseases, especially emerging diseases, which bear a high risk for man and animal, such as brucellosis, scrapie, blue tongue, pseudo rabies, chronic waste disease, Johne's disease, equine infectious anemia, avian influenza, and the like.
For example, in the United States, Federal and State legislation require not only that calves are vaccinated again brucellosis, but require also that the vaccinations are certified by an accredited veterinarian and are reported to Federal and State authorities. To that end, the authorities provide printed report forms which are filled-in by the veterinarian when he vaccinates the animals of a herd of a farmer. Further, the veterinarian applies a specific tag to an ear of the animal. These tags are administrated by a Federal authority (USDA) and each bear a unique identifier, i.e. a unique number that will then also be entered into the report form along with a description of the animal that has be tagged and vaccinated. Then, separate copies of the completed form are sent to the Federal authorities and the State authorities, and another copy is kept in the file of the veterinarian or the herd owner and will serve as a vaccination certificate.
Similar reporting schemes exist also in other countries. In general, it can be said that regional and national authorities and even supranational authorities tend to establish and improve systems which permit to combat harmful emerging animal diseases more effectively. Moreover, these authorities are increasingly co-operating with commercial companies and institutions that are involved in stock breeding. In this context, many companies and institutions favor the introduction of event based database systems which permit to trace individual animals and animal products throughout the distribution chain and to comprehensively document all important events in animal life such as birth, tagging, vaccination, curative treatment, transport, use for breeding, disease, death by disease, slaughter, disappearance and like some of these events may be governmentally regulated), with the intention to aid prevention of diseases and to give powerful support in case of an outbreak.
in the US, for example, the National Animal Identification System (WAIS) has resulted in the development of the National Premises Information Management System and the Animal Trace Process System (ATPS), which involve the development of event based Animal Tracking Databases (ATD's).
These attempts to establish an efficient and networked disease management structure depend crucially on diligent and continual cooperation of all entities involved, especially stock breeders and veterinarians. On this background, the conventional paper-based reporting systems become increasingly problematic because they are prone to errors and failures and imply and increasing workload on veterinarians and/or animal owners. Especially, with an increasing number of database systems for an increasing number of diseases, it becomes more and more difficult for individuals to keep an oversight over which information has to be reported to which authority or institution.